The organs of perception
Among these five elements: from the sattva part of space the organ of hearing came to be; from the sattva part of air, the organ of touch; from the sattva part of fire, the organ of sight; from the sattva part of water, the organ of taste; from the sattva part of earth, the organ of smell.
Among these five elements, the ear arose from the sattva aspect of space; the skin from the sattva of air; the eye from the sattva of fire; the tongue from the sattva of water; and the nose from the sattva of earth.
The ear of flesh is intact, yet in deep sleep no sound is heard. On this teaching, what does that show?
- That the power of perception is not the bodily part but a subtle instrument, withdrawn while the seat remains.
- That hearing depends on the loudness of the sound and nothing more.
- That the ear must be damaged for hearing to stop.
- That deep sleep destroys the organs and they are formed anew each morning.
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The powers of knowing, drawn from the bright strand
Five elements have come forth, and now from each of them something finer is drawn. Every element carries the three strands together, sattva, rajas, tamas, and here it is the sattva portion that is taken up, the bright strand, the one that reveals. From the sattva of space comes the power to hear; from the sattva of air, the power to feel touch; from the sattva of fire, the power to see; from the sattva of water, the power to taste; from the sattva of earth, the power to smell.
The fit between them is not loose. Sound is the quality of space, and from space comes the hearing that takes in sound. Form is the quality of fire, and from fire comes the seeing that takes in form. Each power of knowing is born of the very element whose quality it will know, so that the organ and its object answer to each other from the first. This is why the bright strand and not another does the work. Sattva is the strand that shows, and an organ of knowing is nothing but a small showing.
And the organ here is not the part of the body you can touch. The ear of flesh, the eye in its socket, these are only the seats where the power sits. The organ itself is subtle, a power and not a thing, belonging to the subtle body that is being put together strand by strand. So perception is the work of an instrument. It is assembled, it is made of the elements, it can be traced back to its strand and its source.
Which leaves a quiet question for the one who is following the inquiry inward. If the eye sees and the ear hears, and both are instruments drawn from the elements and laid aside in deep sleep, then the seer is not the eye and the hearer is not the ear. The light by which they work is borrowed. What lends that light, and itself perceives nothing, is being kept apart here from everything that does.
When seeing happens, are you the eye that is doing it, or the one for whom the eye is an instrument?
In the commentaries
Each of the five elements carries the three strands, and it is the sattva portion, the bright, knowledge-revealing strand, that yields the power to perceive; the active strand, rajas, will yield the organs of doing. So the ear is not the curl of flesh and the eye is not the ball in its socket. Those are only the seats. The organ itself is the subtle power of hearing, of seeing, drawn from the sattva of space, of fire, and seated there. And the fit is exact: the power that hears is born of the very element whose quality is sound, the power that sees of the element whose quality is form, so that each knowing meets its own. The point is not anatomy. It is that perception belongs to the instrument, the subtle body being assembled here strand by strand, and not to the Self, which lends its light and perceives nothing on its own.